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POP AND JAZZ GUIDE

Here is a selective listing by critics of The Times of new or noteworthy pop and jazz concerts in the New York metropolitan region this weekend. * denotes a highly recommended concert.

CLAUDIA ACUNA, Sweet Basil, 88 Seventh Avenue South, above Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village, (212) 242-1785. Ms. Acuna, from Chile, is a new jazz singer with a debut record on Verve; she came up through the group of musicians who work at Smalls and has that gang's air of bohemian living-for-art that can produce, over time, great jazz performers. She is still developing, but her voice has a strong, unglossy musicality; the young New York jazz scene will be here cheering her on. Sets through Sunday are at 9 and 11 p.m., with a 12:30 set tonight and tomorrow night; cover charge is $20 tonight and tomorrow night, $10 on Sunday; $10 minimum all nights (Ben Ratliff).

* KING SUNNY ADE AND HIS AFRICAN BEATS, S.O.B.'s (Sounds of Brazil), 204 Varick Street, at Houston Street, South Village, (212) 243-4940. Everything is multilayered in King Sunny Ade's juju music. Meshed guitar riffs, horn lines and drums add up to a prismatic funk behind Mr. Ade's gently determined voice; even his lyrics are layered with comments from talking drums. His band is an orchestra, a party, a dance contest, and one of the finest ensembles in any form of music. Tonight at 9; admission is $22 (Jon Pareles).

BOTANICA, the Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard Street, TriBeCa, (212) 219-3055. As part of ''The Song,'' the series organized by the fabulous Joe McGinty and Glen Max, Paul Wallfisch brings a pared-down version of his shiny-dark gothic lounge ensemble, with his buddy Kid Congo Powers as guest on guitar. Sunday at 10 p.m. on the Knitactive Sound Stage; tickets are $10 (Ann Powers).

* DICK DALE, Wetlands, 161 Hudson Street, at Laight Street, TriBeCa, (212) 386-3600. Dick Dale, king of the surf guitar, is no polite nostalgia trip to the 1960's. He's after elemental forces with the stomping beat of his tunes and his heavily reverbed, brusquely picked guitar lines, along with the dive-bombing tremolo guitar glissandos that leave his guitar picks melted. Tomorrow at 11:30 p.m.; admission is $15 (Pareles).

* OSCAR D'LEON, Copacabana, 617 West 57th Street, Clinton, (212) 582-2672. Oscar D'Leon, from Venezuela, leads one of the tightest, most exuberant bands in salsa. He sings in a soaring tenor, spins his upright bass and cues riff after kinetic riff from his band's horns, piano and percussion. Today after 11 p.m., with Ruby Perez and Cuco Valoy also leading their bands; admission is $25, or $35 for reservations at tables (Pareles).

* KEVIN DRUMM, Tonic, 107 Norfolk Street, Lower East Side, (212) 358-7501. It takes 10 seconds of exposure to Mr. Drumm, a young Chicago guitarist, to know that his technique was developed in solitude. With the instrument laid flat on a table, he deftly taps pointy objects against pickups, rattles something on the strings; you lean forward to hear the raw electric sound of amplified plugs buzzing into their jacks as he minutely controls the whole clicking, pinging sonata with unremarkable knobs and pedals. Even if you've seen this done before, by wayward guitar improvisers like Fred Frith or Keith Rowe, you'll be startled: Mr. Drumm is a careful artisan, perfectly unpretentious, and his performances are neither arid nor cheaply funny, the pitfalls of this sort of art. Tonight he plays a solo set at 8 and a duet with Sonic Youth's guitarist Lee Ranaldo at 10; admission is $10 (Ratliff).

DIO, Irving Plaza, 17 Irving Place, at 15th Street, Union Square, (212) 777-1600. Ronnie James Dio is not only still belting it out like the heavy metal thunder god he is, but he is also coming up with concepts to make his wails all the more florid. ''Magica,'' the latest Dio album, tells of a lost kingdom saved from bad enchantment by a teenage hero and a band of sorcerers. Now that's imagination! The Unband, retro metalheads, share the bill. Tomorrow at 8 p.m.; tickets are $22.50 in advance, $25 the day of the show (Powers).

GIRLS AGAINST BOYS, Maxwell's, 1039 Washington Street, Hoboken, N.J., (201) 798-0406, and the Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard Street, TriBeCa, (212) 219-3006. Grinding guitar funk, gritty punk attitude and smoky decadence merge in the songs of Girls Against Boys as Scott McCloud sings about liaisons that start after hours and end with trouble. Tonight at 10 at Maxwell's; admission is $8. Tomorrow night at 9 at the Knitting Factory, with the opening band Enon, a band that throws clanky noises into snappy pop structures. Admission is $10 (Pareles).

THE GO, Maxwell's, 1039 Washington Street, Hoboken, N.J., (201) 798-0406. Rock! Roooock! RAAWKKK!! That's about all you can say about the Go, a shaggy band of loud-guitar loyalists maintaining the raw traditions of its hometown, Detroit, with songs straight from the MC5 and Stooges songbooks. With Holmes, Johnny Chan and the New Dynasty 6, and the Cherry Valance. Tomorrow at 9 p.m.; tickets are $7 (Powers).

* BENNY GOLSON, Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, 58 Seventh Avenue, Park Slope, (718) 622-3300. One of the great composers of the postwar jazz tune, Mr. Golson is also a truly great tenor saxophonist, capable of jolting an audience with an advanced sense of harmony. Tomorrow at 8 p.m.; admission is $20, or $15 for students and the elderly (Ratliff).

HOME, Mercury Lounge, 217 Houston Street, at Ludlow Street, Lower East Side, (212) 260-4700. This Tampa-based collective, which has made a cottage industry within the field of charmingly strange avant-rock, recently released its 14th effort, called, as expected, ''Home XIV.'' Come watch the group twist various musical elements into knotty patterns of noise. Tomorrow at 8 p.m.; admission is $8 (Powers).

* ZAKIR HUSSAIN, SULTAN KHAN, V. VIKKU VINAYAKRAM, Town Hall, 123 West 43rd Street, Manhattan, (212) 840-2824 or (212) 545-7536. Small hand-held drums -- tabla, the two-headed pakhawaj and the ghatam (clay pot) -- yield kinetic, dizzyingly complex rhythms in India's improvisational traditions. This concert is dedicated to Zakir Hussain's father, the tabla master Alla Rahka, who died this year, and is to feature his music. Along with six drummers (including Mr. Hussain's two brothers), Ustad Sultan Khan will perform on the sarangi, an ancient bowed string instrument. Tomorrow night at 8; tickets are $25 to $45 (Pareles).

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FREEDY JOHNSTON, Mercury Lounge, 217 East Houston Street, at Ludlow Street, Lower East Side, (212) 260-4700. Freedy Johnston's finely turned folk-rock songs have carefully balanced melodies that he sings in a winsome tenor. But for all their classic symmetry, they're the confessions of some desperate, unsavory and unbalanced characters. Tonight at 8, with Anna Fermin's Trigger Gospel and J. C. Hopkins opening; admission is $12 (Pareles).

* UTE LEMPER, Town Hall, 123 West 43rd Street, Manhattan, (212) 840-2824. Ute Lemper has built a career on classical art songs, especially the corrosive cabaret songs of Brecht and Weill; now, she's seeking out their modern descendants. This program is to feature songs from her new album, ''Punishing Kiss,'' with twisted love songs by Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, Nick Cave and Nick Hannon. Tonight at 8; tickets are $25 to $45 (Pareles).

* JOSHUA REDMAN QUARTET, Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Avenue South, at 11th Street, West Village, (212) 255-4037. Mr. Redman has a new album (Beyond, on Warner Brothers), and has laid aside the burden of trying to convert young fans by jazzing up the Beatles. For the moment, with a new band that includes a rhythm section of the pianist Aaron Goldberg, the bassist Reuben Rogers and the drummer Gregory Hutchinson, he is digging into originals. The band seems to be traveling into jazz's language of uncertainty: strange time signatures, the yowl of late Coltrane. At the root of things, Mr. Redman is a terrific saxophone player, and if he's progressing, it's worth hearing. Sets through Sunday are at 9:30 and 11:30 p.m., with a 1 a.m. set tonight and tomorrow night; cover charge is $20; with a $10 minimum (Ratliff).

GIANT SAND, STACEY EARLE, the Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard Street, TriBeCa, (212) 219-3055. Inimitable, irascible, irresistible: all those words apply to Howe Gelb, the shaggy bard of the desert steppes near Tucson. He's still leading Giant Sand through his well-rooted, high-flying avant-rock visions. Stacey Earle takes a much more down-home approach to country rock; she's a salty, self-styled ''simple girl'' who loves a good rock 'n' roll riff. Tonight at 10; tickets are $10 (Powers).

SASHA AND JOHN DIGWEED, Twilo, 530 West 27th Street, Chelsea, (212) 268-1600. A longing for rapture and transcendence is never far from the surface of dance music, particularly in the utopian pulsations set out by the English disk-jockey partnership of John Digweed and Sasha, starting their third year of monthly appearances at Twilo tonight. In their marathon sets of dance music, steady repetition holds time at bay and floating, whooshing sounds and voices suggest freedom from the rigors of form. Doors open at 11, with Jimmy Van M warming up and John Digweed and Sasha continuing well past dawn. Admission is $35 (Pareles).

JOE SATRIANI, Hammerstein Ballroom, 311 West 34th Street, Manhattan, (212) 564-4882. Aspiring hard-rock guitarists turn out to gawk at Joe Satriani's fast, fast, fast scalework and tremolo-bar squeals as well as the stomping tunes he writes to show them off. He has discovered electronica on his latest album (tagging along after Jeff Beck), so he may bring drum machines and sequencers along with his band. Tonight at 8; tickets are $35 (Pareles).

SILVER APPLES, Cooler, 416 West 14th Street, West Village, (212) 229-0785. The Silver Apples are part of electronica's roots. On albums released in 1968 and 1969 they emerged as an unlikely duo: a musician and singer named Simeon who played an early homemade synthesizer, also called Simeon, and sang about ''oscillations, electronic evocations of sound's reality,'' with a drummer, Danny Taylor, who played shifting, abstract pulses. They've modernized only a little. Tomorrow night at midnight; admission is $12 (Pareles).

* CHRIS SMITHER, PETER CASE, Bottom Line, 15 West Fourth Street, Greenwich Village, (212) 228-7880. With a weary, well-traveled voice and a serenely intricate fingerpicking style, Chris Smither turns the blues into songs that accept hard-won lessons and try to make peace with fate. ''Love You Like a Man,'' the song Bonnie Raitt borrowed from him in the 1970's, only hints at the thoughtful intensity of his more recent songs. Peter Case's songwriting inclinations have carried him from the power pop of the Plimsouls to wryly folky songs; he can be a wise guy, a man in love and a precise observer of the down and out. Tomorrow night at 7:30 and 10:30; tickets are $20 (Pareles).

SURVIVAL SOUNDZ, BAM Cafe, 30 Lafayette Avenue, at Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn, (718) 636-4111. This New York collective has invented its own musical style, Rootzbop, that incorporates the sounds of the streets and the nightclubs from St. Croix to Atlanta to Brooklyn. Featuring the stirring vocals of Carla Gomez, jazz horns and a rhythmic mix that can go from dub-slow to positively frisky, Survival Soundz offers a package tour of Funkytown. Tonight at 9; admission is free, but a table minimum of $10 is required (Powers).

DIONNE WARWICK, Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts, Walt Whitman Hall, Brooklyn College, Flatbush and Nostrand Avenues, Flatbush, (718) 951-4437. Anyone who has a heart adores Dionne Warwick, whose grace and prudence in interpreting the songbook of Burt Bacharach and Hal David made her a star in the 1960's and are serving her again, now that grace and prudence are back in fashion in some quarters of the pop world. Tomorrow at 8 p.m.; tickets are $40 and $35 (Powers).